Heather Dubrow Reveals How She and Her Husband Were Conned Out of Nearly $2 Million
The #RHOC actress tells a cautionary tale in the latest episode of her podcast.
Hell hath no fury like a Heather scorned, and that statment has never been more true than in the lastest episode of Heather Dubrow's podcast released Tuesday. In it, The Real Housewives of Orange County actress recounts an ongoing story of how she and husband Terry Dubrow were allegedly swindled out of nearly $2 million in an investment gone awry.
After having money in their pockets following the sale of their home, Heather said that she and Terry's accountant of more than 20 years, Gary Hoffman, convinced the couple to loan money to a woman he had apparently known for years named Jennifer Lindsay Bell. She was to use the money to rent out apartments to those attending the World Cup in 2014, charging a premium so that she would make back millions of dollars, according to Heather. The Dubrows signed a Personal Guarantee with Gary, which meant that if the deal went bad, he would personally reimburse the couple's investment. “So you know, here’s a trusted adviser," Heather said. "Our accountant for multiple, multiple years. It seemed reasonable, World Cup soccer, these apartments, he’s known this woman for a long time.”
When everything was said and done, Heather and Terry ended up giving them $1.75 million in total. Unfortunately, the first payment from Jennifer bounced, and when they went to Gary to get their money back, he said he didn't have any, according to Heather. What's more, they later found out that Gary was not a Certified Public Accountant, as he had claimed to be, but a tax preparer, and he had met Jennifer only a few weeks prior to setting up the deal with the Dubrows.
Heather and Terry decided to sue Jennifer, but that proved to also be a difficult process. Heather said that she continued to lie when they communicated with her, and they were worried that she might flee the country if they went public with the story. So the Dubrows decided that the only way to move forward was to subpoena Jennifer. Jennifer was so hard to track down that Heather said they had to trick her into coming into Terry's office by saying they were going to give her the $26,000 check she requested in order to give them all of their money back in full.
After Jennifer didn't pay her lawyer and failed to appear in court as a debtor in a judgement hearing, a $2 million bail was set and a warrant is out for her arrest. Heather said that they now have intel that Jennifer may be in London.
Heather and Terry also sued Gary. He admitted that he barely knew Jennifer, that he didn't have the money to back up the loan, that he's not a CPA, and he admitted to fraud. Heather said she and Terry are dealing with his insurance company now.
Now the Dubrows are offering a $25,000 reward for anyone that has information that will lead to Jennifer's arrest. “I think that Terry and I are relatively smart people," Heather said. "We f***ed up. We did. We didn’t do this appropriately. This was an incredibly expensive lesson."
However, she's hoping that something good will come out of this painful and expensive ordeal. "One of the reasons we wanted to go public with this is because they’re gonna do it again," Heather said during her podcast. "If we don’t tell people who they are and this happens again, that’s our fault. And if someone else, the person that this happened to before me had spoken out, maybe that wouldn’t have happened to me. So I don’t want this to happen to anyone else."
For that reason, over the coming weeks, Heather will feature guests on her podcast that will be able to share their expertise on finance and what to do with money with her listeners. “I think that this is more common than people think. It’s not just celebrities; it’s everyday people," Heather said. "Let’s all learn together.”
One of those people is bounty hunter Zeke Unger, with whom Heather spoke about her struggles to track down Jennifer during the rest of the podcast.
Thankfully, Heather said she and Terry were able to come away from this incident stronger than ever. “We’re partners in life, in success and in failure, everything in between," Heather explained. "So he messed up, I messed up, whatever it is. We take it together. What I love about it is that we’re strong and we’re together. Thankfully, it didn’t devastate us."
However, Heather is definitely not feeling the love when it comes to the people that burned her in this deal. "It’s a sh**load of money, and I want it back," Heather said when wrapping up this segment of her podcast. "I want them punished. I want everyone to know who they are, and I don’t want this to happen to anyone again.”
This isn't the first time Heather and Terry have been in business together. See them prepare to go on EVINE Live together during last season of RHOC in the clip, below.
